


Dead (At the Time)

by Wonderlandleighleigh



Series: Boarding School Buddies [20]
Category: Batman (Comics), Castle, Gilmore Girls, Iron Man (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Making it up As I Go Along
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-18
Updated: 2013-09-18
Packaged: 2017-12-26 23:07:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,421
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/971365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wonderlandleighleigh/pseuds/Wonderlandleighleigh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rick and Alexis get a surprise visitor.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dead (At the Time)

There's a yelping screech and Rick is up and out of his desk chair like a bat out of hell.

Alexis had gone to get the door.

When Rick gets to the front hall, Alexis is quaking and there's a man on his knees in front of her, too weak to stand.

"Dad, help!" Alexis cries with tears in her voice. "He just...he just collapsed-"

Rick takes her by the shoulders and pushes her aside, and when he looks at the man in the doorway, he feels tears in his own eyes. "Oh my god."

Jason Todd looks up at them. His eyes are wide and blurry and his hands are scratched and bloody. He looks older...so much older than...

He died at fifteen and this Jason Todd looks around nineteen.

His voice is hoarse and quiet. "Li'l help..."

Alexis pushes past her father with a sniffle and leans down, wrapping a thin arm around him and pulling him to his feet. "S'okay, Jay...it's gonna be okay..." She struggles under his weight. He's a big guy; verging on Rick's height, but she manages to help him toward the couch.

Rick is still stunned. "Alexis..."

"We should call a doctor," she says.

"We don't even know-"

"Dad," she snaps, her sixteen years suddenly seeming much more in her voice.

He fumbles with his phone, then as he watches Alexis tug the boots from Jason's feet.

*****

Lanie Parish isn't used to working with the living. As an NYPD medical examiner, it's her job to work with the dearly departed. Occasionally she'll take a look at a living subject, but it's rare. 

Never, ever before has she done a check-up on the formerly deceased.

The kid's gorgeous. Strong, square-jawed. He's got sharp, green eyes and raven hair with a white streak running through his bangs, and Lanie wonders how someone so young could earn something like that.

"He's banged up real good," Lanie tells Castle and Alexis. "Bruised ribs. A concussion. But other than that, he's in perfectly good health."

"Is it okay for him to sleep?" Alexis asks, agitated. "I mean with the concussion-"

"It's minor," Lanie says, soothingly. "And he definitely needs some rest. Why don't you go sit with him a while. He's pretty shaken up, I'm sure he could use some company."

Alexis nods and rushes from the kitchen, leaving Lanie to stare at Rick.

"Where'd this kid come from?"

"Originally? Or recently?" Rick asks. He's obviously just as shaken up as Alexis and the boy on the couch. "Cause if you're asking about the last four years, I got nothing."

"That boy has dirt under his fingernails," Lanie says seriously. "Castle-"

He huffs and rubs his face. "Four years ago, Jason was beaten nearly to death and then caught in an explosion in Ethiopia." Rick swallows hard. "He died there. We...the funeral was...he was fifteen, Lanie. He was a fifteen year old boy."

Lanie stays quiet for a long moment. "Then how is he here?"

Rick's face turns grim. "I have my suspicions. I need to make some phone calls."

"Rick-"

"Thank you," he says quickly. "Thank you so much for coming. I know it's late and this was inconvenient."

"Tell me what's going on," Lanie says sternly. "Now."

He shakes his head. "I can't. Partly because I don't know, and partly because if I did, I'd be betraying a very deep, long-lasting trust." He places a hand on her arm and gently leads her toward the front door.

"Bye, Doc," Jason waves. "Thanks for the look-see."

Lanie looks back at the kid and then at Castle, before walking out the door. 

*****

Instead of going home, she heads to the precinct, with her tiny sample of DNA. She’s startled half to death by Kate, who’s working late, as usual.

“Jesus, girl!”

“What? You know I’m almost always here,” Kate grins a little. “The question is, what are you doing here?”

“Being nosy,” Lanie mutters as she heads for the lab, her best friend trailing after her. “Castle asked me to stop by and examine someone.”

“Castle’s got a dead body in his house?” Kate asks, quirk an eyebrow.

Lanie opens her mouth, and then doesn’t know how to respond.

Kate’s smirk dies and she looks shocked. “He’s got a dead body in his house?!”

“No!” Lanie cries. “No. The kid’s alive, he just…apparently didn’t used to be.”

Kate just looks confused after that and Lanie sighs heavily as she goes through the motions of labeling a bag with Jason’s hair in it to go to the boys at the lab to check DNA. She tells her about the night; Castle calling, going over and realizing there was dirt under the boy’s fingers and that his wounds were consistent with climbing out of a casket; Castle’s admission that the boy had died four years prior and was now somehow lying on his couch.

Kate stares at her and then shakes her head. “And you believe him? Come on, Lanie, he’s probably just playing an elaborate-“

“The kid’s ribs were bruised,” Lanie cuts her off. “He had a real concussion, and that was real blood on his hands and dirt under his fingernails.”

Kate gets serious then. “Like he’d clawed his way out of his own grave.”

Lanie nods. “Like he’d clawed his way out of his own grave.” She seals up an envelope with the hair in it and then marks it “URGENT” before putting it into the outbox. “And Castle was way too cagy about the whole thing for me not to go looking.”

Kate snatches the envelope up. “I’ll get this to the lab, and have it back in an hour.”

*****

Alexis falls asleep on the couch with Jason, but Rick stays up, eyeing his cell phone for a long moment before dialing the emergency number.

“This had better be good,” Bruce says, his voice gravely and deep.

Rick says nothing for a long moment. “Bruce…”

There’s silence then, and Bruce realizes something is wrong because he eases up on the Batman voice.

“Rick…?”

“Jason showed up at my door tonight,” Rick says quietly, rubbing his eyes.

“Blood?”

“No. Not Jason Blood. Jason.”

Again, there’s silence, and then Bruce hangs up on him.

Rick sighs heavily and redials, waiting.

He gets no answer this time.

*****

“You had no right!” Rick yells. “I asked you to come over and check him over!”

Jason watches as Rick yells at the two women in front of him. They’d shown up early with DNA results and a strand of Jason’s own hair.

“You called me in the middle of the night!” Lanie cries. “No explanation, no nothing! And then you tell me the kid I’m checking over is dead!”

“Formerly,” Jason says, giving a wry grin.

“Jason Todd was murdered by the Joker four years ago,” Kate snaps. “And these DNA results conclusively put this boy as a match for him. You’ve got some explaining to do, Castle.”

“Me?! What do you think it is that I know?!” Rick cries. “He showed up on my doorstep last night! All I’ve done is put a roof over his head for less than twenty-four hours!”

“You could just ask me,” Jason says, watching them. “If you’re all done acting like chickens with your heads cut off.”

Alexis is sitting next to him, holding his hand tightly and she’s not gonna let go any time soon.

God she grew up pretty. She used to be a gangly little kid and now she’s all kinds of beautiful.

“Fine, you wanna explain?” Lanie asks. “Let’s hear it.”

Jason nods and leans forward. His ribs are still a little tender and his head is still swimming just a little but he can tell he’ll live.

After all, he’s had worse.

“I don’t remember much,” he admits. “Just that there was a flash of green and…wet. And then…I don’t know. There was something blurry that happened and it was cold, and then there was nothing again…until I opened my eyes and I was in a wooden box.”

“And you clawed your way out,” Kate says.

Jason nods. “Yep. I was disoriented…I don’t even know how I got here from Gotham…I just sorta started walking.”

“Why didn’t you go to Bruce?” Rick asks.

Jason snorts. “Yeah. That woulda gone real well.”

“The man is your adoptive father,” Kate says, narrowing her eyes. “Why wouldn’t that have gone well?”

Jason blinks and then looks at Rick. “Ooh. She’s new, huh?”


End file.
